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Most Vulnerable Asia-Pacific ETFs On China Issues

The summer 2015 woes of China have resurfaced in winter 2016, making global stocks go ballistic. While China shook the global markets in August when its policymakers devalued the country’s currency by 2% against the greenback, the latest Chinese economic data have been extremely weak to start the new year. Activity in China’s services sector expanded at its slowest rate in 17 months in December. There was a trading halt on the key Chinese bourses, with the indexes diving 7% to start the new year. The decline was the worst single-day performance since the 8.5% decline on August 24, 2015, which was the root of the global market rout last summer. Additionally, China’s central bank guided the yuan to a five-year low in offshore trading on Wednesday, which raised expectations of further weakness in the Chinese economy and sparked off fears of a currency war among the export-centric Asian nations. Many analysts are now projecting a free fall in yuan so that the currency can reach equilibrium . As a result, hordes of global stocks have been offloaded, leading them to the most awful start to a year in 16 years. Spiraling woes in the Chinese economy and apprehensions of a currency war in the near future, especially among its Asian neighbors, led the Asian shares to suffer their largest weekly decline in over four years. Export-centric Asian economies may be now forced to depreciate their currencies to stave off competitive pressure and rev up their exports, while growth issues in China have marred investing prospects of countries with close trade ties (see all Asia-Pacific emerging ETFs here ). In any case, the Asian region has been buckling under pressure for quite some time now, thanks to bleeding capital. Apart from slowing growth, the region faces threats from the Fed tightening and its ominous impact on the Asian currencies. A continued hike in interest rates will add to the strength of the greenback, which in turn would devalue a set of Asian currencies. Moreover, a few Asia-Pacific economies are commodity-rich and tend to underperform massively in a period like this, when commodities are slouching. All these offhand occurrences clarify the recent sell-off in the Asian shares. Below, we highlight a few Asia/Asia-Pacific ETFs which are highly susceptible to issues in China. These ETFs lost massively in the last five trading sessions (as of January 8, 2016) on the Chinese market upheaval, more specifically at the start of the new year. The funds are likely to bounce back more swiftly as soon as the doldrums in China calm down (see all Asia-Pacific (Developed) ETFs here ). iShares MSCI Australia ETF (NYSEARCA: EWA ) – Down 9.6% China is one of the largest trading partners of Australia, and thus acts as a key driver in the movement of the latter’s economy. This is why Australia ETF EWA retreated 10.4% in the last five trading sessions (as of January 7, 2016). The fund has a Zacks ETF Rank #4 (Sell). iShares MSCI South Korea Capped ETF (NYSEARCA: EWY ) – Down 5.2% Korea was also left in a quandary, as Chinese currency devaluation raised concerns over general trade. There are several South Korean companies, namely Samsung Electronics ( OTC:SSNLF ), Hyundai Motor ( OTC:HYMLF ), LG Corp. ( OTC:LGEAF ) and Daewoo which have big export markets and thus pared gains. Also, the nuclear test by North Korea had an adverse impact on the South Korean securities. EWY was down 5.3% in the last five trading sessions (as of January 7, 2016). The fund has a Zacks ETF Rank #3. iShares MSCI Taiwan ETF (NYSEARCA: EWT ) – Down 7.6% Apart from South Korea, the Taiwanese economy also thrives on exports. As a result, Taiwanese companies also recorded losses on fears of losing on currency competitiveness to China. Notably, Taiwan houses one of the largest semiconductor companies in the world – Taiwan Semiconductor. In short, South Korea and Taiwan’s stock markets will be hit by yuan devaluation in a passive way. This Zacks Rank #3 ETF lost 8.3% in the last five trading sessions. iShares MSCI Singapore ETF (NYSEARCA: EWS ) – Down 4.8% Singaporean securities were under pressure lately on issues in the neighboring country China. This happened even after Singapore reported faster-than-expected expansion in the economy. EWS has a Zacks ETF Rank #3 (Hold). Original Post

5 Strong Buy T. Rowe Price Mutual Funds

Founded in 1937 by Thomas Rowe Price, Jr., T. Rowe Price currently manages $725.5 billion worth of assets (as of September 30, 2015). This renowned publicly owned investment management firm manages more than 100 mutual funds across a wide range of categories. Additionally, T. Rowe Price offers other financial services, including a wide variety of investment planning, guidance tools, subadvisory services and retirement plans. With over 5,000 employees and more than 5,900 associates, the company serves clients throughout the globe. Below, we share with you 5 top-rated T. Rowe Price mutual funds. Each has earned a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1 (Strong Buy), and is expected to outperform its peers in the future. To view the Zacks Rank and past performance of all T. Rowe Price mutual funds, investors can click here to see the complete list of T. Rowe Price funds. T. Rowe Price Media And Telecommunications Fund No Load (MUTF: PRMTX ) invests a major portion of its assets in securities of companies involved in operations related to media, technology and telecommunications. It primarily invests in common stocks of large- and mid-cap companies. The fund has a three-year annualized return of 15.4%. Paul D. Greene II is the fund manager of PRMTX since 2013. T. Rowe Price Blue Chip Growth Fund No Load (MUTF: TRBCX ) seeks capital appreciation over the long run. The fund invests the lion’s share of its assets in common stocks of growth-oriented blue chip companies. It focuses on acquiring securities of large- and mid-cap companies with strong fundamentals. The T. Rowe Price Blue Chip Growth Fund has a three-year annualized return of 16.3%. TRBCX has an expense ratio of 0.72%, as compared to the category average of 1.18%. T. Rowe Price Capital Appreciation Fund No Load (MUTF: PRWCX ) invests a minimum of half of its assets in stocks. The rest of its assets are expected to get invested in other securities, including convertible securities, debt securities issued by both government and corporate bodies, and bank loans. It may also invest a maximum of 25% of its assets in securities issued in foreign countries. The T. Rowe Price Capital Appreciation Fund has a three-year annualized return of 11.5%. As of September 2015, PRWCX held 265 issues, with 4.21% of its assets invested in Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc. T. Rowe Price Growth and Income Fund No Load (MUTF: PRGIX ) seeks long-term growth of capital and income. It uses bottom-up analysis to invest in both growth and value stocks of companies. To select growth stocks, the fund focuses on companies that are expected to provide above-average growth. The T. Rowe Price Growth and Income Fund has a three-year annualized return of 13.4%. Jeffrey Rottinghaus has been the fund manager of PRMTX since June 1, 2015. T. Rowe Price CA Tax Free Bond Fund No Load (MUTF: PRXCX ) invests a large share of its assets in debt securities that are expected to provide interest income free from federal and California state income taxes. It seeks high tax-exempted income through prudent portfolio management. The T. Rowe Price CA Tax-Free Bond Fund has a three-year annualized return of 4.3%. PRXCX has an expense ratio of 0.49%, as compared to the category average of 0.90%. Original Post

Is It Time For Smart-Beta ETFs To Enter The Bond Markets?

By Detlef Glow The new year has started, but the financial markets are still affected by topics from the old year. One of the topics that has come up again is the liquidity of bonds in general-and bond funds in particular. From my point of view nearly all that can be said has been said about this topic. After all this discussion about liquidity in the bond markets and the possible implications for bond funds, especially exchange-traded funds (ETFs), one might raise the question of whether these issues could be addressed with smart-beta products. These products concentrate on the liquidity of securities in addition to using the two main drivers of performance-duration and credit risk. Since the liquidity of the underlying securities is already an issue for ETFs that track the broad indices, even “plain-vanilla” products are nowadays not far from being smart-beta products. That is because of the optimization techniques used to replicate the returns of the underlying index using the tradable securities in the index basket. In this regard a smart-beta strategy that employs the liquidity of the bonds would help to build liquid indices for all kinds of bond sectors, which could then easily be replicated by funds. In addition, a smart-beta approach could help investors overcome the major struggle of market-weighted bond indices: these indices give the highest weightings to issuers (companies, countries, etc.) with the highest outstanding debt in the respective investment universe. This approach can lead to high single-issuer risk within the portfolio, which is normally not the intention of an investor who buys into a broad market index. A smart-beta approach could limit the issuer risk by introducing a cap within the index methodology. From my point of view smart-beta ETFs could be the answer to the questions and concerns raised by investors around bond indices. Since investors tend to buy only products they understand, the index construction must be quite smart. At the same time it must be as simple as possible, so investors can easily understand the investment objective and the risk/return profile of the index and therefore of the ETF. That said, in my opinion it is time for smart beta to enter the bond markets. The views expressed are the views of the author, not necessarily those of Thomson Reuters.